Topic: Nintendo 3DS Discussion

[Caterkiller]

Oh yeah forgot about that.

[TJ Spyke]

I didn't know about it either until I got done trading with a friend in from school and it asked me if I wanted to register them to the Pal Pad (when I clicked yes, it added him without me needing to enter his FC).

[BlackNMild2k1]

Big Time Japanese Producers Speak On The 3DS

Suda 51
GrassHopper Manufacturer's CEO and the man behind Killer 7 and No More Heroes has not yet announced any 3DS games. He told Famitsu, "I was able to feel the speed of progression of video game history, and also the feeling of 'We've come this far.'" Seeing the 3DS made him feel like there is a real touchable world inside the screen. "To express the game I want to make in a word, it's 'The Next Game.' Nintendo 3DS is the arrival of 'The Next Hardware.' So, 'The Next Game.'"

Atsushi Inaba
The CEO of Platinum Games has no current 3DS product announced. But boy does he seem excited! Said Inaba, "I experienced a strong jolt of the feeling 'I want to make something.' When I first saw Wii and DS at Nintendo's home office, I was also excited. It's the same feeling here, but the level is completely different this time. Since the start of the game industry, there's never been a system that better fit the words 'dream' and 'next generation.'"

Yoshinori Ono
The Super Street Fighter IV producer is working on Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition. He told Famitsu that outside of just the 3D visuals, he'd like to expand the fun of the game through the 3DS's other new features. "We'd like to put in some ideas that make effective use of the portability."

Hiroyuki Kobayashi
The producer of such games as Devil May Cry, Resident Evil 5 and Sengoku Basara doesn't have any announced 3DS projects. Upon seeing Nintendo's titles running on actual 3DS hardware, he was "extremely surprised" to find that the images truly do come out from the screen. "Our own Resident Evil was shown on the show floor and was well received, but when I saw Metal Gear, I felt the new potential of the 3DS. I'd like to make something."

There's more at the link


Now lets hope all this HYPE turns into actual support and they aren't just blowing smoke again.

[alexlam]

I'm almost tempted to sell my DSi for the Nintendo 3DS. I hope the 3DS will be under $200 when it makes it way here in North America.  Anyone know if they have done any research to see if there will be any long term side effects for staring at a 3D screen over an extended period of time? I'm just thinking it's not healthy for your eyes..

[NWR_insanolord]

I don't think the technology's been around long enough for there to have been any studies like that. I'm sure, though, that, if there were any indication of a possibility of a serious issue with it, it wouldn't be being pushed as much as it is by so many companies.

[Ymeegod]

Actually they already have statements about long term effects, namely kids 7 and under shouldn't be playing any 3d game/movie due to muscles in the eyes not being fully formed.  Also a few odd warnings about people getting stokes from images poping up on the screen.  In general there's not much difference between 3d and normal 2d, the other warning like flashing bright colors ect effects both sets.


 

[BlackNMild2k1]

I didn't see a thread on Kid Icarus 3DS and I didn't want to start one, but here is a dev interview on the game
http://www.1up.com/do/newsStory?cId=3180382

[BlackNMild2k1]

Also here is an article on the PICA 200 that powers the 3DS
http://game.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/series/3dcg/20100715_380961.html

Operating frequency of the processor at the time production demo of 200MHz, a 400MHz memory data rate, DDR SDRAM 256MB video has been connected with 256-bit bus. Host connection bit 64 / 66MHz PCI bus, or 32-bit / 33MHz PCI was the bus supports both, or was an experimental project for middle, last bus was at that time to support PCI-Express was delayed.
[...]
Anti-aliasing 4X (2X2) corresponds to the super-sampling method and multi-sample method. For the 1X system multisample pixel resolution, Z buffer to be 4X the resolution, but the most common implementation. The ending of PICA200 "OpenGL/ES1.1 +1.1 basic functions expansion pack" will feature up.

That's just a small snippet and this article needs to be translated by someone that speaks the language since you get words like this:

the evolution of the GPU will be done in sync with the evolution of Puroguramaburushedaakitekucha.

The translation is kinda hard to understand so I hope someone that speaks Japanese can translate it.

[MegaByte]

The part you quoted was regarding their old PC tech.  The PICA 200 stuff is near the bottom.  It says OpenGL 2.0 is required on PC to emulate OpenGL 1.1 ES plus their MAESTRO extensions.  I hope those proprietary extensions don't make things too difficult now that the rest of the mobile space has already moved to OpenGL 2.0 ES.

[BlackNMild2k1]

The part you quoted was regarding their old PC tech.  The PICA 200 stuff is near the bottom.  It says OpenGL 2.0.

Is it?

I saw this: "Nintendo 3DS adopted "PICA200" is the previous ULTRAY2000 optimized for embedded devices and mobile devices, based on customized versions will be."

and figured that PICA200 is based off the ULTRAY2000 which had 256MB DDRSDRAM so that would mean that the PICA 200 is likely to also have 256MB of the same if not better.

But like I said, it was a Google Translation and was hard to understand. Thanks for pointing it out.

[MegaByte]

Optimized for embedded always mean less RAM.

[BlackNMild2k1]

Oh, well sometimes less is more.

and if you embed some better faster RAM, then you don't need as much to get the same if not better results, right?


256MB of RAM just for video in the 3DS wold be great though. especially if paired with another 256MB of RAM for everything else too.

[MegaByte]

It's not a direct trade-off, but presumably the 3DS wouldn't need as much RAM anyway, given its low resolution.

[DAaaMan64]

256 vid ram is just ridiculous. I doubt 3ds would ever need that.

[BlackNMild2k1]

256 vid ram is just ridiculous. I doubt 3ds would ever need that.

A wise man once say "It's better to have and not need, than to need and not have"

If the 3DS is gonna be a little more than just a game machine, then it should have a little more than what it needs just for games.
Nintendo doesn't need to go all out, but they've made plenty of money and can afford to not cripple their system by penny pinching everything. RAM is cheap, so it wouldn't hurt to have a little more than you think you would need.(Same goes for Flash mem) It's time Nintendo gets a little forward thinking and prepares for what the machine may be capable of 2-3 or more years down the road and not just build it around the games they are making now.

[AV]

256 vid ram is just ridiculous. I doubt 3ds would ever need that.

A wise man once say "It's better to have and not need, than to need and not have"

If the 3DS is gonna be a little more than just a game machine, then it should have a little more than what it needs just for games.
Nintendo doesn't need to go all out, but they've made plenty of money and can afford to not cripple their system by penny pinching everything. RAM is cheap, so it wouldn't hurt to have a little more than you think you would need.(Same goes for Flash mem) It's time Nintendo gets a little forward thinking and prepares for what the machine may be capable of 2-3 or more years down the road and not just build it around the games they are making now.

I agree. For websurfing and aps it would be great to have tons of ram to help speed it up.

[Stratos]

And for streaming movies from Netflix.

[DAaaMan64]

256 vid ram is just ridiculous. I doubt 3ds would ever need that.

A wise man once say "It's better to have and not need, than to need and not have"

If the 3DS is gonna be a little more than just a game machine, then it should have a little more than what it needs just for games.
Nintendo doesn't need to go all out, but they've made plenty of money and can afford to not cripple their system by penny pinching everything. RAM is cheap, so it wouldn't hurt to have a little more than you think you would need.(Same goes for Flash mem) It's time Nintendo gets a little forward thinking and prepares for what the machine may be capable of 2-3 or more years down the road and not just build it around the games they are making now.

I agree. For websurfing and aps it would be great to have tons of ram to help speed it up.

lol that **** isn't going to use video ram, thats just gonna use RAM RAM.

But yeah of course, the more the better while the price is right!

[AV]

And for streaming movies from Netflix.

Hulu Plus as well.  It would be epic if you could stream and temporarily save it and watch when your not connected online. Not sure how that's possible without hackers getting ahold of it, but the idea sound great in my head

[Kytim89]

If the 3DS online structure is good and viable, could we see a MMO for the 3DS? Imagine a World of Warcraft or Everquest game on the go. Any kind of excuse to get the fans of these games out of the house and expose themselves to sunlight.

[Deguello]

256 MB might be a bit much for the 3DS RAM (although considering the higher requirements for 3-D processing, it's possible that more RAM than usual could be necessary.)

I'd expect something between 128 and 256 MB, considering Nintendo never really uses standardized numbers (Like how the GC and Wii both have weird numbers like 43 MB and 88 MB of RAM, and it's all spread out over the console to the areas that need it).

I wonder if they'll still use that MoSys 1T-SRAM that they've used since the GC.  It's pretty good stuff, although more expensive than the usual RAM, mainly due to it's low-power consumption.  I'm thinking they will for precisely that reason, but I wouldn't expect something beyond 256 MB at the absolute max, which is sort of overkill for the kinds of stuff that the 3DS will play.

[DAaaMan64]

We should specify whether we're talking about video ram on the GPU or just the same o' ram the CPU will be working with. 256 video ram is HUUUUUGGGGGGGEE for a thing with such a small screen.

[NWR_insanolord]

Assuming the 3DS will have a universal OS, wouldn't it need extra memory beyond what it needs for games to keep that running in the background?

[DAaaMan64]

Assuming the 3DS will have a universal OS, wouldn't it need extra memory beyond what it needs for games to keep that running in the background?

Yes. If this is directed at me though, then I'm not sure what your getting at. A developer can not simply (ride into...) switch whether he's using video ram and normal ram. Video ram you have to go through an API like DirectX or OpenGL to use, and even then access is limited and controlled by the driver/gpu.

[NWR_insanolord]

I was referring to Deg's talk about regular RAM.